NORWICH – The City of Norwich Common Council unanimously approved a resolution Tuesday night to designate 71 parking spaces in the Hayes Street Municipal Parking Lot for the prospective hotel project at 14-16 South Broad Street and no more than $25,000 in in-kind services for the reconfiguration of the lot.

Principle Design Engineering, PLLC Project Engineer/Manager Dan O'Reilly, Managing Partner Mike O'Reilly, and project collaborator Patrick McNeil asked for the city's support at the city joint committees meeting on February 6 to designate 71 parking spaces for the prospective hotel.

At the joint committees meeting, Mike O'Reilly said in order for the project to move forward they would need a hotel flag, and that a hotel flag requires one parking space per hotel room, as well as for hotel employees. McNeil was steadfast that without the designation of parking, the hotel project would stop.

Dan and Mike O'Reilly, along with McNeil, presented a plan to the council that would reconfigure the municipal parking lot to add 18 parking spots, thus increasing the total parking from 123 spots to 141 spots. McNeil supplemented the plan with figures from a Chenango County Lodging Study, which estimated $800,000 a year in revenue is lost in the county because of a lack of quality lodging.

On Tuesday, Alderman Ward 1 Matthew Caldwell asked about how the enforcement of designated the parking spots would work, and McNeil said the city wouldn't have to police it at all.

"When we did the proposal to the joint committees, we asked for designated spots. We're not asking you to police it, we're not asking you to monitor it. We would like a few signs that say hotel parking."

Alderman Ward 5 David Zieno said, "So what you're saying is, you're really just looking for signage?" McNeil said yes.

Splendor Inn Bed and Breakfast, Chenango Inn and Suites weigh-in

During the meeting's open forum, Joint Owner of the Splendor Inn Bed and Breakfast Chris Smith voiced his concerns to the council about the proposed $25,000 in services the joint committees had approved to send to the council for the parking reconfiguration.

"The concerns that we have are that the new hotel is getting a disproportionate amount of parking spaces in that parking lot. It's getting $25,000 of City of Norwich tax dollars to sort out the parking spaces. As a business we feel that the playing field is not level, and that the new hotel is getting favorable treatment," said Smith.